hopelessly wrong. The right of the mi nority as against the right of the majority contains the reflection that the right that was right might have been wrong if it had not resolved itself into a question of mathe matics. The questions presented in this interesting rubber-stamp signature case were, first, was a rubber-stamp signature made by another than the owner of the stamp, a forgery? The signatures would be exactly similar in either case, made with the same stamp, the only difference so to speak being as to whose hands pushed the button. Second, as a bank is bound to know the signature of its depositors, and if it pay out the money on a forged check it cannot charge the depositor with the amount, but as against him must bear the loss, was a bank responsible for payment of a check containing a forged rubber-stamp signature? The facts were that the plaintiff, as president of a corporation, had occasion to send out a large number of invitations to a ban quet, and in order to save himself the labor of writing his name so often, had a rubber stamp made which would make a facsimile of his signature. For a time the stamp was kept in the company's off1ce, but after he re signed the presidency it was sent to his pri vate office which he rented from a gentleman who had the adjoining off1ce. With this off1ce he was entitled to the services of an office boy of about sixteen years of age. For about nine months he employed this boy for errands and messages, including the sending of him to bank to draw money on checks. He never had occasion to doubt the boy's honesty. When the rubber stamp was re turned to the plaintiff from the corporation office, he placed it in a compartment inside of a fire-proof safe. He locked this com partment and put the key in a drawer in the safe behind some papers and covered it up. He then locked the drawer and put the key in another unlocked drawer in the safe. He then locked the safe and put the key in a little
box, which he put in a wooden drawer or box and this was kept on top of another safe. The plaintiff's surmise was that the office boy had watched his moves, found where he kept the safe key, opened the safe and rummaged arour1d until he found the stamp and with it signed two checks. One portion of the divided court were of the opinion that they could not assent to the proposition that it is negligence per se for a depositor to have in his possession a harm less and useful thing as a rubber stamp, and one lawful for him to have, but which, in the hands of a thief, breaking into his house or his safe, may be used to forge his signature. If he commit the use of it to an agent, select ed by himself, or leave it in such a place as to invite the use of it for illegitimate pur poses, there would be plausibility in the con tention that he should be deemed to con template such use as one of the natural and probable consequences of his act. But where he has used due care in securing it against unlawful use by others, it cannot be said that his mere possession of the thing was the proximate cause of the mispayment of the money to one who unlawfully possessed himself of it and used it to commit a for gery. To hold that the plaintiff must have kept the stamp absolutely inaccessible to others would be to hold the owner of a rubber stamp up to the same standard of responsi bility as the owner of a vicious animal, in other words, to hold that he is bound to keep the stamp at all hazards where a tres passer or a thief cannot possibly get posses sion of it and use it. This is not the standard of his responsibility to the bank in which he is a depositor or to the public. He is not an insurer against its unlawful use, but it may be conceded that he is responsible for the consequences of his negligence in keep ing it. He is bound to exercise the care of an ordinarily prudent man. A fair sub mission of the question of fact to the jury would be, was it put away in such a manner
